Things you never knew you wanted to know about OJ

I love getting unexpected stuff in the post. Well, I love the idea of getting unexpected stuff in the post - the opening the envelope bit, the mystery. It’s the same reason I like Hitchcock films and Varga girls. But just as a Hitch flick can turn out to be a Topaz or a Rope, so the unsolicited corporate dross that drip-feeds my in-tray usually leaves me high and dry.

But sometimes you come across a Vertigo. Take yesterday morning. A PR at Yale University Press thought I might be interested in reading Alissa Hamilton’s Squeezed: What You Didn’t Know About Orange Juice. Good thinking, nice PR – I’d been hearing chatter for ages. With Wired production dates being what they are, it missed the boat for June’s Play section. So, instead, here’s the juice (concentrated)…

It’s a bit like an extended New Yorker article: a zesty investigation that crafts a gripping story from something you never cared about before. Now, that does mean it’s cut from the same cloth as many other trendy non-fiction books – both in tone and in volume of anecdotes – but it sits at the more academic end of shelf.

Thorough research and original sleuthing take us through the array of trials and tribulations that have beset the humble glass of orange juice, from the manufacturing process to economics via regulatory battles. Her findings at the very least make for some pub chat trump cards: that its popularity comes down to a wartime vitamin C deficiency and a Florida surplus, that most of the oranges now come from Brazil, and that ‘not from concentrate’ OJ can be stored up to a year stripped of its flavour before having the flavour re-added prior to sale.

It all adds up to a less unpleasant Fast Food Nation, and an a-peeling read (sorry).